Sometimes (oftentimes) the question quality is just.. meh. Not enough research, for example. Not worthy of downvoting, but not upvoting either. That doesn't make such a post answerable. Why equate the two?
– Martijn Pieters♦Oct 14 '14 at 15:33

I can have a quick answer to a question without deeming the question worthy of an upvote.
– PatriceOct 14 '14 at 15:41

The example you gave. I wouldn't upvote it simply because the op hasn't shown any attempt at solving it on his/her own. On the surface it looks like a "i can haz codes" question. (though that's pretty typical with regexp questions)
– Kevin BOct 14 '14 at 15:44

2

If you're trying to imply that you think you deserve upvotes from everyone who answered that question of yours... this probably isn't going to work out the way you hope.
– Andrew MedicoOct 14 '14 at 15:47

18

Are you asking questions because you want answers, or because you want upvotes?
– Bill the LizardOct 14 '14 at 15:48

The real question is: Why do people keep answering questions they don't feel are worthy of upvoting? And the answer is simple: Rep whoring. (Just to not be misunderstood, I'm as guilty of that as anyone else)
– yannisOct 14 '14 at 16:33

@Yannis: This happens in reality all the time. Someone vomits a question that is really uninformed and slangy, yet a good teacher may tell a great answer.
– Sebastian MachOct 30 '14 at 14:37

@walther What about it? Why is helping one person - especially one that didn't bother doing any effort solving their own problem - more important than helping a community of developers? Spoon feeding doesn't have any positives, however you might spin it. The only thing you gain by answering questions that don't show any prior effort is legitimizing laziness.
– yannisOct 30 '14 at 14:48

5 Answers
5

Why should questions always be upvoted when answering, or when upvoting an answer? Neither the fact that an question is answerable nor the fact that an answer is upvote-worthy means that the question itself is worthy of an upvote.

And what is the reasoning behind this? Mark the question as "good", because you were able to answer it? That doesn't make any sense. It's like asking "hey, why don't you answer the question you've upvoted?".

To be honest, you shouldn't upvote any question you ever answer, because you might be encouraging meh questions. People then don't understand the difference and it seems you don't either.

The best reason to upvote a question is not because you feel a sense of social obligation. It is because the question was helpful to you, and this frequently means that you would have asked it yourself if the other person hadn't already.

When answering a question you are pretty unlikely to need the answer yourself. It could happen but probably not often. As such, your upvote would be purely social and less motivated than a vote of genuine gratitude. That seems optional.

Being useful doesn't necessarily mean that use is scoped to you, it could mean that the question was going to be useful to a broader audience as well, in which case it would make sense to upvote it.
– Travis JApr 26 '16 at 22:41

Let's draw a parallel. We'll start by assuming there are two separate things at play: (1) the quality of the question/amount of research that went into it, and (2) how answerable it is.

Let's assume I'm a waiter. I have a lot of control over how much attention I pay to the table: do I answer questions, and provide a lot of detail about today's specials? Am I attentive, and know what I'm talking about? Or do I just come up to the table and say "go ahead". Think of that as the quality of the question, and the amount of research.

But - the waiter has no control over the food coming out of the kitchen. It may impact his tips, or it may not. The tip is supposed to reflect the quality of the wait staff, not the quality of the food. Just because I ate the food, doesn't mean that I think the waiter did a subpar or an excellent job.

Likewise, just because I answer a question, it doesn't mean that I think it deserves an upvote. I might upvote it anyway, even if the question wasn't asked very well, just because it's a REALLY interesting and unexplored topic. In the same way, I might tip a waiter, despite his shoddy service, just because the food was phenomenal.

Just because the two functions CAN impact each other does not mean that they WILL impact each other.